The winners of the Suffolk Education Awards 2023 have been announced, and here we find out more about the organisations that won gold in the Outstanding Support for Students category and the Wellbeing Award category, sponsored by Active Suffolk.
Outstanding Support for Students
And the winner is… Inspire
Inspire is a youth charity in Ipswich that takes young people outside of the classroom to help them build the skills they need to become well-rounded adults.
Inspire’s programmes focus on education, experiential learning and personal development. It provides students with opportunities to get involved in their local communities, work together and uncover their strengths beyond the academic.
The charity is also proud of its commitment to inclusivity and the support it provides
for students with learning difficulties or disabilities, with 33% of participants disclosing that they face these challenges.
The support that Inspire offers can help to change lives, tackling a range of issues that young people face. In the past 12 months, the charity has helped nearly 1,500 young people to improve their confidence, build new skills, learn to handle adversity and find their path in life.
After receiving the award, Neil Fox, quality and improvement manager at Inspire, said: “it feels great to be representing all of my colleagues and the work that everybody does across the ages and across the region supporting young people.”
Project co-ordinator Jay Wallace-Langan added: “There are obviously a lot of other really good people nominated. But for us to be recognised for what we do, it feels amazing.”
Congratulations to the finalists: Castle Hill Infant and Junior Schools, Eastern Education Group and Suffolk New College.
The Wellbeing Award
And the winner is… Ilketshall St Lawrence School
Ilketshall St Lawrence School in Beccles, near the Norfolk/Suffolk border, is part of the multi-academy trust ASSET Education.
The school follows a ‘Complete Human Strategy’ approach to wellbeing based on six pillars for excellent physical and mental health: positivity, time well spent, relationships and communication, expertise, structure and stability, and place.
Each year, the school writes a comprehensive strategy for wellbeing based on these pillars and works on embedding them within the school while supporting other schools to do the same.
Ilketshall St Lawrence has a number of initiatives in place to support pupils’ wellbeing, including the implementation of a wellbeing garden, which the children helped to design; monitoring pupil wellbeing and agency termly through a company called ImpactEd; and carrying out parent engagement surveys to ensure that families are happy with the school’s communication.
When asked how it felt to win the award, headteacher Sarah Orves said: “I’m overwhelmed to be honest because I did not expect to win it, but I am thrilled that we have won it because I know that all the wellbeing work we do across our trust really has taken off. It has overwhelmed all of us with the impact that it has had.”
Congratulations to the finalists: Fairstead House School, Lisa Davies – Meadowbrook Playcare and Suffolk New College.
To find out more about all of this year's winners, please click here.
For more information and updates on the Suffolk Education Awards 2024, please keep an eye on the website at suffolkeduawards.co.uk
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